The loneliness of the old drifters

A new group of elderly people are drifting northward for the sake of their children and grandchildren, and we call them ? Old Drifters? The loneliness of the old drifters is what I bring to you, I hope it will help you.

The loneliness of 18 million old drifters

In the morning to eat breakfast, listening to his mother said downstairs neighbor Wang Auntie insomnia again.

It turns out that Auntie Wang's son works for a foreign company and recently bought a house, finally settling down in Shenzhen. The parents in the countryside are getting older, the farm work can not be done, the living conditions of the family is more difficult, the son and daughter-in-law a discussion, the old couple picked up in Shenzhen.

Auntie Wang thought that she could join her son to enjoy the happiness. The first thing I've learned is that I'm a very busy person, and I'm not sure if I'm a good person, but I'm a good person. Instead of hiring an outsider who's always on the edge of his seat, he can take care of it himself, and help out with the rest of his life. The idea that you can see your son every day, that you can tease your grandchildren, and that you can enjoy your life, is a wonderful thought.

But the first thing I noticed in Shenzhen is that I have a lot of sleepless nights.

The old lady used to work in her hometown during the day, and at night, she would talk to other old people, and then gradually go to sleep. The night in the countryside is quiet and dark, except for a few lights in the distance and the occasional barking of dogs, there is only the sound of lonely frogs. In such quiet nights, the old lady always fell asleep as soon as she laid her head on the pillow, and slept almost until morning. The old man is very strong and has a very regular life.

After coming to Shenzhen, because of the direction of the home is facing the road, the night until eleven or twelve o'clock can hear the noise of the car, coupled with a new building next to the start of construction, the noise of the machine stirred up the old man a little distracted. Shenzhen is a city that never sleeps, the lights at night are still blinding, and the neon lights on the roofs of the buildings across the street still shine through the curtains. The old man just came to the first few days is the whole night and night again and again can not sleep. The first few days of his life, he was unable to sleep all night long. Because he didn't have a good night's rest, he couldn't get up in the daytime, and his face wasn't as moist as it used to be.

The second discomfort of coming to the city is that there is nothing to do.

In the past, in the countryside, there was always a lot of farm work to do, a few chickens to feed, a pig to raise, and a few acres of land to take care of. Now it seems like there's nothing to do. In the morning, my son and daughter-in-law go to work, and my grandson is sent to the kindergarten, so I don't think there's much to do at home. Since I just came to the big city, I am not familiar with the surrounding area, and I am afraid of getting lost, so I don't dare to go out to stroll around, and I can only stay at home and watch TV. The first time I saw this, I was able to get the ball rolling.

The third discomfort is that there is no longer a nagging object.

The old man came from the rural areas of Shaanxi Province, with a strong accent, and did not speak much Mandarin. There's not much of a hometown around, and most of the neighbors downstairs just nodded and laughed. Sometimes I really want to chat with others in my spare time, but on the one hand, I don't speak the language, and on the other hand, I don't know what to talk about. I'm not sure what I'm talking about, but I'm sure I'll be able to find someone to talk to if I'm not in the same building as my grandchildren.

Of course, it's the son's family that's the most important thing.

I thought I would be able to see my son and grandson every day, and the family would be happy. The first time I saw this, I was able to see my son's face, and I was able to see his face, and I was able to see his face, and I was able to see his face, and I was able to see his face, and I was able to see his face. Daughter-in-law is from Guangdong, the food and living habits of her hometown are different from her daughter-in-law's, and she doesn't like to eat the food she cooks, and sometimes she even dislikes that the hygiene isn't done properly, and that the child's clothes are worn too much, and so on. The old man is sometimes careful, fearing that the daughter-in-law is not happy.

The children in the city are not easy to work in the north, and the north of the old man came to a strange city, the child has been her all. If the relationship with the child is not handled well, this is not in a peaceful old age, but in the frying pan suffering.

It's not about living in peace, it's about suffering in the frying pan

According to incomplete statistics, last year, China? Nearly 18 million people, although most of them can better adapt to the new environment, but there are a lot of elderly life is difficult to integrate into the city life, health care housing is difficult to get protection and other practical problems. Underneath the glamorous exterior, under the envious gaze of their old family members, is the lonely, low self-esteem existence of the elderly.

There is a very extreme example around me, where a son traveled overseas for many years, and his daughter-in-law just gave birth to a pair of twins, so she called his mother to help bring up the children. As a result, the two strangers have a big difference in concepts and habits, and the mother-in-law and daughter-in-law often quarrel for some trivial things, which did not do as a loved one of the son of the coordination of the loved ones, the whole family has become a smoke filled battlefield.

One night the old man because of some trivial and daughter-in-law had a quarrel, daughter-in-law because she just became a mother in a hurry to get angry temper, often on the old man pointing his nose at the eyes, coupled with the husband is not around for a long time, the heart of the resentment of the brain brain to the body of the mother-in-law, more than ten o'clock in the race to the mother-in-law out of the house. The mother-in-law has no place to go, only know that back home need to take the high-speed rail, and do not know how to touch the high-speed rail station, but all the high-speed rail has been suspended, so in the high-speed rail station squatting for a night.

The aggrieved old man then remembered to give his son a phone call. The son heard the worry as much as burning, but in a different place can not help, only hate blind to find the daughter-in-law heart too hard. As you can imagine, the family war is a touch and go. On the one hand is just had a child's wife, on the other hand is aggrieved by the late-night kicked out of the home to sleep at the high-speed rail station mother, there are two newborn baby, his heart was torn. He called his wife a scolding, the two almost to the point of divorce.

The things old drifters fear most

My mom and dad are actually considered ? My mom and dad are actually considered to be "old north drifters". They retired and came to my side to help me bring up my children. I went to a big hospital because the beds were tight and could not be arranged, but my own illness and have to operate immediately, I had to go online and find a private hospital, and did not tell me to arrange for their own hospitalization. After hospitalization, the hospital delayed scheduling surgery until a week later. The operation seemed to go well, but the disease recurred a few days after discharge. This left the old man in agony.

I rushed to get a friend to help me get admitted to a major hospital. Surgery was scheduled for the second day of hospitalization, and the postoperative recovery was very good. I was so guilty that I didn't pay much attention to my dad. The cost of private hospitals is several times that of large hospitals, and it is not cured, causing the old man to receive another knife. These hospitalization expenses were taken back home to the Social Security Administration could only reimburse less than 60%. This is the main reason why the elderly do not want to come to the big city to live.

For the old drift family, the most afraid of is sick, if it is a chronic disease can also be a bit, if you get an emergency hospitalization, hospital wards are nervous not to mention the hospital, the money is also a stream, and the children are busy at work, there is no one to take care of, these are very real problems. The old people are generally a little strong, not as a last resort will not ask for help from their children.

Children who are too far away from their parents are ungrateful?

If the northern drift is due to the economic development and the emergence of the flow of talent, then the ensuing old drift represents the concentration of our family relationship is too high, rely on each other and can not be separated psychologically and lead to.

The traditional Chinese culture has the old adage that parents are not far away. Children cannot be too far away from their parents, and children cannot live better than their parents.

Without success beyond the Oedipus conflict, the child will subconsciously believe that he or she cannot be more successful than the parents, and that if he or she surpasses the parents there may be a punishment waiting for him or her and guilt. This is where the child, if successful in his or her career, is required, both ritually and psychologically, to enjoy his or her accumulated wealth with his or her parents***. This is actually a sign of unclear boundaries.

Imagine a child living in a 100-square-foot house in a big city, while his elderly parents still need to face the earth and back to the sky. For the child, he will be very guilty of parents: parents for their own pay a lot, sacrificed a lot, to provide children to study adult, and pay after the child will have expectations. If the child can not return to parents in accordance with the parents' expectations, even if the parents do not say, the child may not be able to pass around the countryside folks that pass, back on an unfilial scolding, so that the child has a kind of close to the countryside love timid 'feeling.

And on the side of the parents will have such a realization, you are my birth, your things are mine, you are now in the city have a good life, actually do not return parents, you kid is forgetting the original, and will even give the child labeled an ungrateful.

We have seen a lot of conflict in the families of the North, in addition to the conflict of daily habits, the most critical is the conflict between the family of origin and the nuclear family. It seems to be a family, in fact, it is two families in *** with life, which must be less power struggle, such as children with whom the pro, children should listen to who, who arranged the meal at home, the taste of the meal to listen to who, these subtle minutiae of life are reflected in the power of family members of the tug-of-war between the tug-of-war.

How to return the old drifter to a good old age?

The dilemma of cracking the relationship between mother-in-law and daughter-in-law in family relations lies in the fact that the relationship between parents and children is too close and too concentrated. The relationship between parents and children in most families is in an undifferentiated state: parents are worried about the separation of their children, and the children are not yet able to be fully independent, so they depend on and need each other, forming a kind of adhesive relationship state. As a result, Chinese family relationships are a mess.

If a child's intention is to give his or her parents peace of mind in their old age, perhaps we can try to change or work on the following aspects.

Don't be kidnapped by filial piety. What parents really need is a heart to heart connection, if you have the ability to bring your parents around, even if the brocade clothes and sea food, but the child is not home every day, but the elderly have the feeling of prison. In the eyes of outsiders, it seems that the child how filial piety, but the taste only the old man heart understand.

Once a friend's father had a serious illness and was in great pain, but he clearly told his children that he did not want to go back to the hospital. The child, if he allowed his father to be so sick and not hospitalized, was afraid to take the blame for being unfilial, and thought that he was in a position to let his father receive the best medical care, forcing the old man to be admitted to the hospital. As a result, the old man ended his life in a very tragic way, jumping from the floor of the hospital. The father's departure made the child regret that he did not try to understand the old man's real intention, perhaps the old man felt that the rest of his life is not much, a lifetime of being arranged by others, and wanted to do for himself for a time.

Respect the parents' choice. If the parents are willing to come to the child, the child should be welcomed from the heart, so that they have the opportunity to more companionship, rather than the parents as a burden, or directly to the parents as a free nanny use. If the parents are willing to stay in their hometown to spend their old age, the children, in addition to calling their parents often, can also take more time to go home to spend time with their parents. It's probably more important that they choose how to spend their last moments by themselves.

Establish the boundaries of your nuclear family. In their own small home, couples should be very clear about what is their business, such as the education of their children, the family's financial management, the problems between husband and wife, these things are best to be clear with the parents. If the son quarrels with his wife, this is a conflict between husband and wife, if the mother-in-law intervenes, it will make things more complicated.

Don't try to change your parents; change can only come from your own growth and maturity. In fact, taking your parents over to help you bring up your children is another form of nibbling at the old man. I've often heard my friends complain to me that my mother-in-law doesn't want to do anything at home, and when I get off work every day, she leaves the kids with me to go out and dance. The child is our own birth, parenting itself is our responsibility, and we take it for granted that the elderly to help do all the work to bring up the child is a natural thing.

Mom always said that the old man with children is not the right way to teach is not right, always want to change the old man's mind, in fact, the old man is more stubborn, almost adhere to the values of the majority of their lives is difficult to change, rather than in the above to make the effort to make all of us are not happy, but also through their own growth to become more tolerant of acceptance of immutable parts of the old man on their own small family The old man is thankful for his contribution to his small family. The first thing you need to do is to put your heart in the right place in order to get a harmonious intergenerational relationship.

In fact, whether you choose to leave home? The first thing you need to do is to get your hands dirty. to live with children, the most central mechanism lies in the independent personality. Because the independence of the individual will establish boundaries between people, whether or not they live with their children, no matter where they are, they will be able to live their old age.

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